


When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie

by sixchord



Series: A Million Ways to Say [10]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-24
Updated: 2013-06-04
Packaged: 2017-12-06 09:49:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/734307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sixchord/pseuds/sixchord
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles was sprawled on his bed, staring at the ceiling and hating Scott when he got the weirdest text of his life.</p><p>From: Derek<br/>Is Star Wars good?</p><p>(Or, the summer before Stiles goes to college, he and Derek watch a lot of movies...)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "That's Amore" by Dean Martin.
> 
> OKAY GUYS. I haven't updated A Million Ways to Say in forever, and I'm sorry about that. This fic is part of that series, and it's going to be a two-parter. It's also the last in the series (unless I change my mind, which is...likely). Since it'll have multiple parts, make sure you subscribe!
> 
> So, as I said, this is part of A Million Ways to Say. You don't have to have read any of those fics, but there is one part where it might be helpful to have read [this one](https://archiveofourown.org/works/513001).

Stiles was sprawled on his bed, staring at the ceiling and hating Scott when he got the weirdest text of his life.

 

From: Derek

Is Star Wars good?

 

He stared at his phone while his brain whirred, tracing a trajectory from _random, much?_ to _what kind of person has never seen Star Wars?_ Sometimes he just didn’t believe that Derek was real.

 

To: Derek

ARE YOU REALLY ASKING ME THIS?

 

And then,

 

To: Derek

I mean.  Yes.  It’s good.

 

He rolled over and buried his face in his pillow.  Friday night during the summer, and what was he doing?  Making an ass of himself to Derek “I-will-rip-your-throat-out-with-my-teeth” Hale.  It was all Scott’s fault.  He frowned when his phone dinged, and he considered ignoring it.  Curiosity won.

 

From: Derek

So I should watch it?

 

And okay, obviously Derek was not a normal person, what with the whole werewolf thing, but Stiles had adapted to that fairly quickly.  Derek texting him like an actual normal person?  That was just beyond weird.

 

To: Derek

What?!  YES.

 

After he sent it, he realized that maybe he was being a bit harsh.  It wasn’t Derek’s fault that he was pissy because Scott had ditched him for the fifth night in a row to go try and win back Allison’s heart— _again_ —by, like, crying on her and throwing rose petals at her feet.  Whatever.  Stiles was so over it.

But the fact remained that he was being kind of bitchy to Derek, which was the worst way possible to reinforce this weird bout of normal person behavior.  So he sent another text.

 

To: Derek

Okay you know what, no, you are way too old not to have seen Star Wars.  We are watching it.  Now.

 

Well, actually, that was kind of mean too, but whatever.  Derek could deal.  And if he came, fine, if not, his loss, because Princess Leia was really hot and Han Solo was incredibly dashing.  Not that he cared if Derek actually came over, because he definitely didn’t.

He glared at his phone and typed out a new text.

 

To: Scott

DEAR ASSHOLE, I HATE YOU, I’VE ALWAYS HATED YOU AND NOW I’M REPLACING YOU WITH DEREK SO THERE

 

Immediately after sending it, he realized he was being a dick again and frantically sent another because knowing Scott, he would actually take it seriously and, like, start crying again.

 

To: Scott

And obviously by that I mean good luck winning your lady love but if that doesn’t work out I bet you could probably just date Isaac and be a lot happier. 

 

Except, shit, did Scott know about the whole Isaac-liking-him thing?  Was that even a thing anymore?  _Oh God had he just outed Isaac?_   So he sent yet another text.

 

To: Scott

SHIT AUTOCORRECT AHAHAHAAAA I totally meant that creepy Irene chick who sits behind you in calc, bow-chicka-wow-wow, you should totally go for it dude

 

Smooth.  Very smooth.

He threw his phone on the floor and sighed into the pillow.  Life was hard when you had an entire pack of werewolves telling you things you weren’t allowed to let anyone else know about.  Apparently he smelled trustworthy or something, whatever, he had no idea why he was basically the official Pack Secret-Keeper.

At some point he must have fallen asleep, because when his dad yelled up the stairs, he startled awake so hard that he almost fell off the bed.

“What?” he yelled back.

“You have a visitor,” his dad called, his voice kind of strangled.

Stiles rubbed at his eyes.  Visitors were never a good sign.  Most of his real friends just came in through the window, and the others—well, no, Lydia always called before coming over.  And Allison was really only friends with him when she was dating Scott. 

With his luck it was probably a rogue hunter or, like, a vampire or something.

So when he stumbled down the stairs and saw Derek standing awkwardly in front of the door, he had to stop for a moment and just stare.  Then he said, “Is everything okay?”

Derek blinked.  “Yes.”

“Then why did you—“ He waved his hand at the door.

Derek’s eyebrows went up.  “Good manners?” he said.

Stiles started laughing at that because, ha, manners and Derek.  It was pretty funny.  Not that he didn’t like the guy, but seriously—Derek was not usually big on the manners.

“So,” his dad said.  Stiles jumped in surprise because he’d kind of forgotten about his dad, who was standing behind him with his arms crossed.  “What’s going on?”

“Star Wars,” Derek said. 

Stiles’ dad got this really weird look on his face like he couldn’t decide whether he should laugh or just be really confused.  “Old or new trilogy?” he said.

“Dad,” Stiles said.  “Come on.  No stupid questions.”

Derek looked uncomfortable.  He even shuffled back and forth on his feet.  It was kind of refreshing, seeing Derek so awkward.

“Okay, my room?” Stiles said.  He put one foot on the lowest stair and Derek hesitated and then stepped forward.  “Hey Dad, let me know when you’re going to bed and I’ll turn it down, okay?” he called over his shoulder.

“Thanks, kiddo,” his dad said, squinting at him like he was confused or something.

Stiles ran the rest of the way up the stairs—which, Derek Hale was on his stairs, why was his life so weird—and then just went straight into his room.  Derek followed and then looked at the door in confusion.  “Should I—“

“Oh, yeah, close it, my dad hates when anything interrupts his sports.”  He fished the first disc out of the case and popped it into his computer.  “I didn’t actually think you would come,” he said.  “I mean I don’t mind or anything, I just figured you had, like, pack business or something.”

Derek shrugged and said, “Not really.”

If it was possible, Derek was even less talkative than usual, which was actually impressive.  Stiles suppressed an eye roll and instead said, “Okay, so I should explain a few things first.  We’re going to watch the fourth movie, okay?”

“But—“ Derek started.  Stiles held up one hand, cutting him off.

“Yes, I know, but it really doesn’t matter because they made the fourth movie first, right?  Then the fifth, then the sixth.  And then like twenty years after the series ended, they went back and made the first.  Okay?”

“That’s ridiculous,” Derek said.  His eyebrows did some complicated maneuver which Stiles assumed meant Derek was getting skeptical.

“Yeah, tell me about it.  Also, the new trilogy isn’t so great.  I mean I will totally still watch it for funsies but it’s just not as good.  So, we’re gonna watch episode four.  Yeah?”

“Sure.”  Derek glanced around awkwardly.  “So I’m gonna, um.”  His eyes flicked to the bed.

“Oh, yeah, just sit on the bed.  It’s cool.”  Stiles unfolded the TV tray he’d stolen from his dad and stood it in front of the bed.  He shoved at Derek until the guy sat down, and then he put his laptop on the tray and hopped up next to Derek, leaving a bit of space between them.  “You good?”

Derek nodded.  He looked even more uncomfortable, if that was possible.  Stiles leaned forward and hit play.

“I’m gonna do my best not to, like, narrate the whole thing, but I want you to know that that’s really, really difficult for me, okay?” he said.  “Unless you want me to narrate, in which case, yes, that’s awesome, I love talking during movies.”

Derek favored him with a mild glare, so he figured all the talking was a no go.  He leaned back against the wall and then suddenly remembered how Luke’s aunt and uncle died.  “Hey, uh, so if some of the characters were to, say, be burned to death, would you want me to tell you?”

“Well, it doesn’t really matter now because you kind of just told me,” Derek said, rolling his eyes.

“Okay, well, it happens.  Just so you know.”  He crossed his arms and clamped his mouth shut.

After that, he did a pretty good job of keeping his thoughts to himself, which should have definitely impressed Derek.  It took a lot of effort and was a testament to how awesome a friend he was that he kept his mouth shut.

Just as the _Falcon_ was landing on Alderaan, Stiles’ dad knocked on the door and opened it slowly.  He gave Stiles a weird look and said, “I just got called in to work at seven, so I’m going to bed now.”

Stiles nodded and leaned forward to turn the volume down.  “That okay?” he said to Derek, who nodded stiffly.  He grinned at his dad and said, “Want me to bring you lunch tomorrow?”

“Sure,” his dad said, shrugging.  “I’d better turn in now.  Night.”

“Sleep tight,” Stiles said with only a touch of sarcasm.  Once his dad had shut the door, he said, “Want me to run it back?”

“No,” Derek said.  “I’m good.”  He didn’t look bored, exactly, just—really uncomfortable.  The novelty of Derek’s awkwardness had worn off, and Stiles was getting worried that he’d somehow pressured Derek into watching Star Wars, which, they were awesome movies, but Derek probably had way better things to do.

“Do you, uh, like the movie?” he said, twisting his fingers into the hem of his shirt.

“Yes,” Derek said, tapping his fingers on Stiles’ bed.

Stiles sighed and decided that, no, screw everything that had ever happened with Scott and the kanima and the Alphas— _this_ was the weirdest night of his life.

\--

Scott had been sulking for a few weeks, but ever since Stiles had sent him the text about how Derek was the new Scott, Stiles had noticed a significant increase in both the power and frequency of the sulking.  It was ridiculous.  Even for Scott, three full days of mega-sulking was a lot.

“Dude, I was totally joking,” he said.  Scott was silent, all Stiles heard was faint static down the line.  “I know that you are totally pining for me right now, don’t even pretend.  You always get super clingy when Allison dumps you, so I bet you’re in, like, physical pain because your body wants to be with me but your mind is telling you to act like a five-year-old.”

“My body does not want to be with you,” Scott muttered.

“I know, I know, it only wants to be with Allison, whatever, my point is, Derek cannot replace you because Derek is not actually a person.  So stop being a baby and let’s do something.”  He pinched the phone between his ear and shoulder and started googling.  “There’s some meteor shower tonight, wanna watch?”

“I guess,” Scott said in his most droopy voice.

Stiles rolled his eyes and said, “Okay, I’ll come over at ten?”

“Sure.”  He still sounded depressed but he would get over it.

An hour later, Stiles was walking into the station with a salad and diet soda when Scott texted him saying that “ALLISON WANTS 2 TALK CANCEL EVRTHING YAAAAAAY!!!!!!! :):):):)”

Well.  It wasn’t like Stiles hadn’t always known where Scott’s priorities lay. 

So when he got a text from Derek asking if he wanted to watch Episode V, well…he had nothing better to do.

\--

The problem was, watching Star Wars with Derek had apparently become a thing, Stiles realized after the third time.  Every time, Derek came through the front door and his dad looked really confused.  Derek still didn’t really talk to him much when they hung out, although at least he’d stopped answering in monosyllables and was back to his usual level of loquaciousness.  It was kind of awkward but it was also definitely better than Stiles wallowing in his room for hours at a time, hating Scott for getting back with Allison (which was never going to last).

Even though it was pretty awkward for the most part, Stiles would probably never forget the startled yelp of “ _What?!_ ” that had escaped Derek when he found out who Luke’s dad really was.  Honestly, that kind of made up for all the awkwardness.  Especially because Derek had obviously been really embarrassed about it.

He figured they were done with the whole thing when they finished the trilogy, but a few days later Derek texted him and asked if they could watch the new trilogy.

So he said yes, and Derek showed up with a brown bag full of greasy Chinese takeout, and they watched the first movie while eating on Stiles’ bed.  It was all fine until Stiles glanced over during the pod race and saw Derek’s face, eyes wide and mouth slightly open like it was the coolest thing he’d ever seen.

And suddenly there was a tightness in his chest and he almost thought he was going to have a panic attack because _of course_ he liked Derek, he couldn’t just have nice things in his life without something coming along and ruining it.  When Derek looked at him curiously, he just shoved an entire eggroll in his mouth and decided that the best course of action was probably to ignore everything.

\--

When Erica showed up at his window a few nights later, he squawked and grabbed a pillow to cover his chest.  She smirked and climbed in.  “So, how’s it going?” she said.

“What are you doing here?” he said, fumbling for a shirt.

“Sweetie.  It’s nothing I haven’t seen before.”  She smiled at him indulgently and threw herself down in his desk chair.  “I just wanted to see how you’ve been doing.  You don’t come by much anymore.  When are you leaving?”

“Uh, four weeks?  I think?”  He finally found a shirt and wriggled into it.  “You’re still doing online, right?”

She nodded. 

“And Boyd?”

“Online law enforcement degree, isn’t that adorable?” she said, batting her eyelashes at him.  “Next thing you know, he’ll be working for your dad, and you will never get away with anything ever again.”

“Or I will just get away with all the things because I have the entire police force in my pocket,” he said.  “You’d be surprised by how many times my dad has weaseled me out of a court appearance.”

She laughed and twirled around in the chair.  For a minute, Stiles thought she was going to stay quiet, but then as she spun back around, she stuck her foot out and stopped the chair so she was facing him.  “So I hear you and Derek have been watching Star Wars.”

“Er,” he said, trying not to twitch.  “Yes.  You heard right.”

Her eyes narrowed and he was suddenly seized by the feeling that she was staring into his soul, stealing all his secrets—well, really there was just the one secret anymore, the whole Derek-Hale-induced-bisexuality thing.  Or were those two secrets?  No, just one, he didn’t really have any feelings about the bi thing except _oh, that makes sense_ but he had about a million Derek-feelings, none of which he wanted Erica knowing about.

Erica grinned, like her journey into Stiles’ mind had been quite satisfactory.  “You should make him watch _Lord of the Rings_ next,” she said.  “I’m pretty sure he thinks ‘hobbit’ is just a word I made up to insult Scott.”

“Okay,” he said.

“And try and get him to eat some fruit,” she said.  “He won’t listen to me, and Isaac can’t always be around to sadface him into eating healthy things.”

“Okay?” Stiles said.  He was definitely confused.

She waggled her eyebrows with him—Derek’s influence, obviously— and said, “Hey, can I come visit you at school?  Or would that be weird?”

He shrugged.  “Yeah, that’d be cool.  As long as you don’t traumatize my roommate or anything.  And you have to pay your way with candy.”

“Deal,” she said.  She stretched her way to standing and went to the window.  “I’d better go now.  It was nice talking to you.  Don’t forget— _Lord of the Rings._ ”  Then she jumped out the window and was gone.

At least that was normal.  Which, what was his life, when that was normal?  He suddenly wondered whether his friends would be able to climb in his dorm window, which was such a stupid question that he groaned and fell face first on his bed.

Then he checked his phone because it was only like eleven at night, maybe Scott had ditched Allison and—well, no, her dad was out of town, no way would Scott miss out on that.  But he had other friends who might want to do things, things other than telling him to convince Derek to eat fruit.

When he saw the little envelope icon, he got excited for about two seconds before he opened it and saw it was from Derek.  _Movie tomorrow?_ it said. 

He buried his face in his pillow and said every swear word he could think of before texting back, _Fellowship of the Ring.  Pancakes.  7:30._

\--

The weird friendship thing they had going on happened at least twice a week for the rest of Stiles’ summer.  He kept expecting it to get less weird, but if anything, it got _more_ weird.  If his dad was on duty they watched in the living room and Derek’s arm always ended up stretched out along the back of the sofa behind Stiles.  The first time, Stiles thought his brain was going to explode.  It didn’t really get much better after that.

And Derek had started smiling.  Stiles was just not equipped to handle that, because Derek was already stupidly attractive all the time, but when he smiled he was, like, _incandescently_ stupidly attractive.  The first time Derek had smiled at him—over pancakes, which was also becoming a thing—he had actually forgotten what he’d been talking about and had just stared for a few minutes until his brain caught up.  Derek’s smile had _actually rendered him speechless._   That had literally never happened before.

The last time they hung out was the night before Stiles left for college.  They ate pancakes while watching _Good Will Hunting_ and Stiles finally convinced Derek to eat an apple, because it was themed food, okay, he’d put a lot of thought into it.  And Derek had rolled his eyes but he’d eaten the apple, which Stiles definitely did not watch.  Not at all.

When Derek got up to go, he was suddenly holding a long paper tube, which was totally weird because where had he been hiding it the whole time?  “This is for you,” Derek said.

Stiles took it and tried to smile, but he probably just managed to look constipated.  “Thanks.”

Derek shrugged and opened the door.  “Figured you might want it for your room.”  He squinted at Stiles a bit, looking awkward.  “So, uh…”

“You really didn’t have to get me anything,” Stiles said.

“I wanted to.”  The corner of Derek’s mouth began to twitch.  _Nononono_ Stiles thought, _not the smile oh shit just leave just—_ and there it was.  Stupid Derek’s stupid smile, which never failed to totally melt Stiles’ brain into a pile of gelatinous goo.  Every.  Single.  Time.  “I’ll see you soon?” Derek said.

“I—yeah—uh—sure,” Stiles replied.  Nice.  Really smooth.  Not awkward at all.

Derek grinned _even wider how was that even possible_ and then stepped out the door.  “Bye, Stiles.  Let me know when you get there?”

“Nghhhhkay,” Stiles said.  Well.  At least he didn’t have to see Derek for a few months.  Maybe Derek would forget everything by then.

And then Derek was gone, and Stiles ran up to his room and screamed into his pillow for a while.

\--

His dad was driving the Jeep.  His dad would be driving the Jeep back home.  Stiles mentally cursed whoever had decided that freshmen should not have cars.

“I can’t believe you knew,” he muttered for like the twelfth time.

“Oh my god, are you still on that?” his dad said.  “It stopped being funny about twenty minutes ago.”

Right before they’d left, he’d figured that he should probably let his dad know about the whole bi thing.  Just because.  It had turned into a huge fiasco because in the middle of his whole coming out spiel, there was some kind of huge miscommunication which had led to his dad asking if he was finally telling him about the werewolves.  Because his dad knew.  His dad had known.  For like a year.

And, okay, in the same conversation, Stiles had finally managed to tell his dad about the bi thing, but whatever, that kind of paled in comparison to his dad _knowing about werewolves._  

Also his dad claimed to have known that Stiles was bi for at least two years, which was just not fair.  Frankly, he was kind of annoyed that his dad hadn’t told him.

But that wasn’t actually the worst part.  The worst part was that he’d thought Stiles and Derek were dating, which was clearly a deranged and stupid idea.  So Stiles had many reasons to be annoyed, especially considering it was move in day.  Obviously he should have chosen a better day to come out to his dad.

Stiles leaned his head against the window.  It occurred to him that his dad knowing about the werewolf thing was probably some information that Derek should have.

He quickly typed up a text to Derek and sent it before he could over think it.    _Dad knows about the pack, has apparently known for like a year, is surprisingly fine with everything, also I hate my life._

Derek’s reply came surprisingly fast: _Glad to hear.  Don’t want to give him any more reasons to get out the shotgun._

Stiles frowned.  What did that even mean?

\--

From: Scott

STILES VET SCHOOL IS SO FUN OH MAAAAN

 

From: Erica

True love is the greatest thing in the world—except for a nice MLT — mutton, lettuce and tomato sandwich, where the mutton is nice and lean and the tomato is ripe.

 

From: Derek

Erica is trying to convince me to wear sweaters.  Please tell her this is a bad idea.

 

From: Derek

Stiles.  I don’t LIKE sweaters.  And these are striped.  One has snowflakes.

 

From: Isaac

hey stils hows college i hope u like it i love vet school so far we lrned yesterday about bones n stuff

 

From: Erica

We are all a little weird and life's a little weird, and when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love.

 

From: Derek

Why did Erica just dump a bag of apples on me and quote that one movie?

 

To: Erica

Are you trying to tell me something?  Because if so, I’m totally flattered but, and don’t take this the wrong way, I really don’t feel that way about you.

 

To: Derek

Why do you keep asking me these things like I know?  Also sweaters would look really stupid on you.  How do you like them apples?

 

From: Erica

OH MY GOD YOU ARE SO DUMB UGHHHHHH WHY ARE BOYS SO DUMBBBB

\--

When Derek called him after he’d been at school for two weeks, he almost had a panic attack because Derek never called anybody unless something was horribly wrong _._ He stared at his phone for five seconds, and then he answered.  “Is everybody okay?  What’s wrong?  Are you bleeding?  Do I need to come back—shit, I don’t have my—it’s okay, I can take the train, just tell me what’s—“

“Uh,” Derek said.  “Hi?”

“How can you say hi at a time like this?” Stiles cried, flailing even though he knew Derek couldn’t see him.

“A time like what?”

It occurred to Stiles then that maybe nobody was dying.  “What’s going on?” he said. 

“I—nothing?”  Derek sounded confused.  “Is everything okay with you?”

“Um, yes?  I was just doing homework.  It’s terribly exciting.”  He jumped up on his bed.  “So, why’re you calling?”

“I just—thought I should?”

Now Stiles knew why Derek never talked to anybody on the phone.  It was because he was horrible at it.  If Derek was bad at face-to-face interactions, he was somehow even worse at long-distance interactions.  Everything he said was suddenly a question, which was actually kind of funny because this was Derek Hale, the guy who sometimes forgot about vocal inflection.

“Okaaaaay,” Stiles said.  It was really quiet on the other end.  He glanced around his room, trying to find something to talk about.  His eyes went wide when he saw the poster Derek had given him—vintage Star Wars.  The instant he’d unrolled it, Derek had become his new best friend, even if he didn’t know it yet.  “Hey, so where did you find the poster?  It’s awesome.”

“Um, an antique store?” Derek said.

The image of Derek shopping at an antique store was really just too funny.  It would probably never stop being funny.  He tucked it away in his brain for a rainy day.

“That’s hilarious,” he said.

Derek just made a soft noise. 

Eventually Stiles took pity on him and just started rambling about school.  He went on and on about how much he hated his chemistry class, even though he was really good at it—no thanks to Harris, of course—and he loved his introductory lit class, because they were reading _Dracula_ , which he’d always kind of thought was hilariously bad.  He just kept talking while Derek hmmed every once in a while.  When he finally ran out of things to say about class, he said, “What about you?  Enjoying your new sweaters?”

“No sweaters,” Derek said.  “I refused to buy them and Erica was broke.”

“Well, that’s good.  Seriously, sweaters just wouldn’t look right on you.  You should try button-downs.”  He realized what he’d just said and groaned internally.  Derek was probably smart enough to know that meant Stiles had spent some time checking him out.

But Derek just said, “Yeah?” in a surprised voice.

“Uh, yeah?” Stiles said.  He fiddled around with the hem of his t-shirt and then said, “Look, I’d probably better—“

“I was thinking about maybe, I don’t know, maybe coming up sometime?” Derek said in a rush.

Stiles pulled the phone away from his ear and just stared at it for a few seconds, blinking.  Then he heard Derek saying his name, his voice tinny.  “Yeah, sorry, I just—yeah, sure, that’d be—fine,” Stiles said, because his life was apparently really an episode of _The Twilight Zone_.  “Hey, you should bring the betas, Erica owes me candy and Scott’s been crying at me all the time because he is actually incapable of being a human without me.  Yeah?”

“Oh,” Derek said.  “Um.  Okay?”

“Cool, awesome.  Yeah, you guys can just come whenever, my roommate got crazy homesick and dropped out, so—plenty of room.”  He rubbed his hand over his hair and frowned again because, seriously, what was his life.

“You have a single,” Derek said, his voice flat.

“Yup, it’s totally awesome.  So yeah, just, whenever you want, I’m pretty much free on the weekends.” 

Derek grumbled something about having to go, and finally, thankfully, Stiles was free to freak out and flail and get none of his homework done because some things were more important than homework, things like _existential crises_ because Derek Hale, who hated everybody, now did normal things like call people. 

And Stiles was still doing that annoying thing where he apparently liked Derek, and now he’d told the guy to bring the pack over for a few days, what the hell was wrong with him?  With any luck Derek would forget about it.  Or maybe he’d just been saying it.  Derek had a weird sense of humor, maybe it was a joke?

Stiles realized it was absolutely not a joke two days later when Scott, Isaac, and Erica tackled him to the ground in the middle of the quad while Derek and Boyd just stood there laughing.  They were horrible people, really.

\--

By the end of the first night, half of Stiles’ floor was madly in love with Erica because she won the entire pot at the weekly Room 412 poker tournament.  Scott had gone to play too, and he ended up losing over twenty dollars (luckily for him, Erica won it, and since he was pack, she let him have it back later).

Stiles was pretty sure the guys on his floor liked his friends better than him, which was kind of troubling but whatever.  His friends were totally awesome, even if some of them had ditched him for gambling.  At least Isaac, Boyd, and Derek stuck close to him.  It was nice to know that he still had some friends left who actually liked him.  Or that’s what he told himself.  He had a feeling Isaac was just sitting this round out, getting his bearings.  And Boyd, even though he was huge and could probably break Stiles just by looking at him, was painfully shy sometimes. 

Derek, obviously, hated everything, so of course he stayed in Stiles’ room and glared at all of Stiles’ decorations (except the poster) like they personally offended him.

“So, uh, what do you guys want to do?” Stiles said.  He was sitting on his bed, actually twiddling his thumbs.

“You should teach me how to play poker,” Isaac said, lounging next to him with his head on Stiles’ thigh.  “Is there another game tomorrow?”

“Well, I don’t actually know how,” Stiles said.  “You should ask Erica.  I think she’s still holding court down the hall.”  He had a feeling Isaac’s sudden interest in poker had less to do with a desire to win money and crush souls (that was all Erica), and more to do with his desire to get with the scruffy baseball player who ran the tournament.  Stiles was not blind, and Isaac was not subtle with his staring.

The worst part was, if Isaac just showed up and batted his eyelashes at the guy, it would probably work.  There was just something about Isaac that made people adore him.  Whereas if Stiles tried that with, say, a really hot, broody werewolf, he would probably just get a death glare.

Speaking of, Derek did not look pleased with the current whereabouts of Erica and Scott.

“What, did you expect all of us to sit around and sing campfire songs?” Stiles said.  “Dude, it’s Friday night.  You’re at a college.  Neither of them has ever been away to college, let them live a little before you bite their heads off.”

Derek frowned and said, “I guess it could be worse.”

“What could be worse?” Scott said as he skidded in.  He was all sweaty and was bouncing up and down with excitement.

“Hey Scott,” Isaac said, lifting his head a bit.  “Teach me to play poker?”

Scott freaked out then because it wasn’t often that he got to be the one teaching people things.  He grabbed Stiles’ card deck from the top drawer of his desk—either Stiles was predictable or Scott was psychic—and they set up camp on Stiles’ ex-roommate’s bed. 

Stiles was about to say something sarcastic about werewolf bros when Boyd’s face cracked into a yawn.  He looked surprised.  “Uh, sorry,” he said, blinking.  “Was up late.”

“Dude, don’t even worry about it,” Stiles said.  “You wanna go to bed?  We can totally go somewhere else and let you sleep.”  Stiles raised his eyebrows and grinned when Boyd actually looked tempted.  “I’m serious.  We can all go hang out in the lounge or something, watch a movie.  Yeah?”  He glanced at Derek.

“Sure,” Derek said, shrugging.  Stiles had a particular fondness for Derek shrugging in his leather jacket.  It was a really stupid thing to like, but there it was.

Boyd yawned again.  “If it wouldn’t be too much trouble?”

“Nah, don’t even worry about it.  Take the spare bed, yeah?”  He snapped his fingers at Scott and Isaac and said, “Hey, let’s take it to the lounge, Boyd needs to sleep.”  They took one look at him, then grabbed the cards and ran out, giggling like idiots.  “Grab my computer, would you?” he said to Derek.

As he left the room with his DVD binder, he yelled a good night over his shoulder.  Boyd mumbled something back.  “The door,” Stiles said to Derek.  Derek glowered at him and pulled the door shut.  “Thanks, man.  Oh, and, sorry I don’t have like an air mattress or anything.  I figure if Erica ever comes back, she can take my bed, and the rest of us can just sleep on the floor?”

“Sure,” Derek said.  There was definitely something off about him, because he seemed even more cranky than usual.  Impressive.

Stiles grabbed the sleeve of his jacket, dragging him to a stop.  He said, “Are you okay?”

Derek raised one eyebrow.  “What makes you think I’m not?”

“You just seem kind of, I don’t know, like you don’t want to be here or something?”

Derek sighed and said, “That isn’t it.”  When Stiles opened his mouth, he held up his hand and said, “I don’t really want to talk about it.”

They ended up watching _The Pagemaster_ because Stiles was very persuasive (or, probably more accurately, Derek just didn’t care).  The wondertwins continued to practice poker, and about halfway through the movie, Erica showed up, looking very smug and wearing a ratty green bathrobe over her own clothes.

“That stinks, get rid of it,” Derek said without looking at her.

“It was a gift, I can’t just get rid of it,” she said.  She flopped down and kicked her feet onto Stiles’ lap.  “The guy who gave it to me was so flattered that I was actually wearing it.  So why are we out here?”

“Boyd’s sleeping,” Stiles said, absently resting one arm on her ankles.

“Gotcha.  Hey, so where are the rest of us sleeping?  Because I met this guy, Henry, and he has a spare bed too, one of us could—“

“Henry is really creepy,” Stiles said.

“Well, yeah, obviously, which is why I figured we could throw Scott in there,” she said.

“Hey!” Scott said, glaring at her from the floor.  “I resent that.  I want to share a room with a creepy guy just as little as you do.”

Stiles rolled his eyes.  He could feel Derek getting tense beside him.  “Guys, I totally have enough room on my floor.  Erica can have my bed, yeah?”

“I just love when guys give me nice things because I’m a girl,” she said, grinning at him.  “Thanks.  I bet your bed is super comfy.  But if it’s all the same to you, I’ll just cuddle up with Boyd.”  When his eyebrows shot up, she said, “Stop that.  I’ll share with Boyd because he’s bound to have the funniest reaction in the morning.  Also he doesn’t move at all when he sleeps.  And he’s really warm.”

“Is this a wolf thing?” Stiles said.  He figured it was more of an Erica-and-Boyd-are-in-love-but-are-too-stubborn-to-do-anything-about-it thing, but it was safer to play along sometimes.

“What, don’t you like to cuddle?” Erica said.  She slid closer to him and nudged her head up against his shoulder. 

“I really don’t have any feelings about cuddling,” Stiles said.  Still, he wrapped one arm around her so she could settle in better.

All of a sudden Isaac yawned squeakily, his eyes squeezing shut.  When he finished, everybody was staring at him.  “Um.  What?” he said.

“Oh my god, you are the most adorable person I have ever met,” Stiles said.  “Just stop it.  I can’t take it anymore.”

Isaac blinked at him.  “Sorry?”

“It’s past Isaac’s bedtime,” Erica said, her head still on Stiles’ shoulder.

Isaac tried to glare at her, but he looked too sleepy for it to be effective.

“Do you want to go to bed, Isaac?” Stiles said.  Isaac turned his puppy dog glare onto Stiles, who mostly just felt like cooing at him.  “Are you sleepy?  Is it time to go nigh-nigh?”  That made Scott glare at him too, which was only slightly more threatening.  Stiles giggled hysterically and accidentally bumped against Derek’s shoulder.

Derek groaned and put his hands over his face.  “Oh my god, my life,” he muttered into his fingers.  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but all of you need to go to bed.  Right now.”

That made Isaac and Scott collapse on top of each other in laughter.  “Okay, Dad,” Isaac choked out.

“Bed,” Derek said.  “Now.  There is too much laughter, I can’t handle it.  Go.”

And then Erica started laughing this really weird neighing laugh, which made Stiles crack up.  Within a matter of minutes, everybody except Derek was crying with laughter.  Stiles accidentally caught Derek’s eye, and he was about to say something, but then the corner of Derek’s mouth started twitching.  The smile knocked the breath out of Stiles, and he leaned heavily on Erica, who was wheezing out giggles still.

“Oh, I, okay,” Stiles said.  “Um.  Tired.”  He eased himself out from under Erica’s left leg and said, “I’m gonna, uh, brush my teeth.”  Then he practically ran away.

And didn’t it just figure that Derek came in as he was frantically brushing his teeth in the floor bathroom.  Stiles stared at him for a good ten seconds, because that was a toothbrush, that was toothpaste, that was _Derek brushing his teeth._

“Something wrong?” Derek said, spitting out white foam and making eye contact with the Stiles in the mirror.

“Uh.  It’s just, you’re brushing your teeth,” he said.  He barely managed to control a frantic arm-wave.  “Weird.  It’s weird seeing you do—normal things.”

Derek laughed at that.  His eyes crinkled and he grinned.  Stiles couldn’t help watching out of the corner of his eye as Derek finished with his teeth.

“I also shower,” Derek said.  “And sometimes I even shave.”

“No, I don’t believe that,” Stiles said, just to have something to say.  “I’m like ninety-nine percent certain your stubble’s just stuck at that length.  I bet it took you forever to get it to come in evenly, and now you can’t shave it because it makes you look all rugged and masculine and wolfy.”  His brain caught up with his mouth and he said, “I mean—“

But Derek was grinning at him again so he wasn’t actually sure what he did mean.  He spluttered a bit and then followed Derek out of the bathroom.

“Take the bed, okay?” Derek said.

“Okay?” Stiles said, his mind still reeling from so many smiles in so little time.

Derek put a hand on his shoulder and leaned past him to open the door to Stiles’ room.  Then his hand slid down Stiles’ spine to the small of his back and Stiles did his best not to have a heart attack as Derek gently pushed him into the room first.

 As Stiles narrowly avoided tripping over Isaac and Scott—who were already sprawled on the floor asleep—he thought that even if Derek hadn’t known about Stiles’ little crush before, well, the way Stiles’ heart was going, he would have to be an idiot not to know now.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> But there were just too many feelings, and he didn’t want to deal with them. The feelings were annoyingly pervasive, because they popped up at inopportune moments, like when Derek smiled and he found himself thinking “oh my god, your teeth, why are they so adorable.” Nothing about Derek Hale was adorable. And what kind of person even thought that about teeth? Clearly Stiles was just going crazy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god I am so sorry I took forever updating this ergh. I am actually the worst.
> 
> Also, I hope everybody is as excited for season 3 as I am :)
> 
> This is the last installment of A Million Ways to Say. I may or may not decide sometime down the line to add more, but this is the end (for now). I always wanted to end it at the beginning, even though that's super cheesy. 
> 
> Thank you to everybody who's stuck with me!!

Stiles spent half the next day hiding in the library.  He wasn’t exactly proud, especially since he’d ditched all of his totally awesome friends who he hardly ever saw anymore, but he just—needed space. 

He could still feel Derek’s hand moving down his back, curving to fit his spine.  The worst part was, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that the whole thinking-Derek-was-hot thing wasn’t actually that new.  In fact, he had traced that particular thought all the way back to the day that Derek had asked him to cut his arm off, which, what the hell was wrong with him?  Or maybe even earlier.  No wonder his dad had known he was bi for years, probably anybody with half a brain knew that and Stiles was just an idiot.

So, okay.  He could deal with that.  He thought other guys were hot.  The baseball player Isaac was lusting after, for instance.  Isaac was even kind of hot in an aww-let-me-pinch-your-cheeks sort of way.

But there were just too many feelings, and he didn’t want to deal with them.  The feelings were annoyingly pervasive, because they popped up at inopportune moments, like when Derek smiled and he found himself thinking “oh my god, your teeth, why are they so adorable.”  Nothing about Derek Hale was _adorable_.  And what kind of person even thought that about teeth?  Clearly Stiles was just going crazy.

One plus of him being a complete coward was that he was hyperproductive in the library.  He’d finished almost all of his homework for the next week, which, on the one hand, meant he had a ton of free time but, on the other, meant he would probably just spend all that free time pathetically reliving Derek touching his back.

He was just putting the finishing touches on his essay about _Dracula_ when someone slid into the chair across from him.  He didn’t even have to look.

“Sorry, homework,” he said, tracing a sentence with his finger.

“Do you want us to leave?” Derek asked.

Stiles wanted to say yes, but he knew Derek would be able to tell it was a lie, and then he would probably get all smug, and really Stiles just did not need that.  “No,” he said, still staring down at his keyboard.  “No, I’m actually done with all my work for the week, so, no.”

“Is something wrong?” Derek said.

He finally looked up.  Derek actually looked worried, which was something Stiles was used to seeing only during life-and-death situations.  “Yes,” he said.  Sometimes it wasn’t even worth lying.  “But I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Fair enough,” Derek said, shrugging.  “You hungry?”

And suddenly Stiles realized that it was four in the afternoon and he hadn’t eaten anything other than a bag of Skittles all day. 

They went to the student union, where Stiles was so distracted that he didn’t even notice Derek pay andorder for him until Derek handed him a tray with food and Stiles thought _where did this come from?_   He felt like they should probably invite the pack along, but no, having one werewolf listening in on his heart doing a Derek-induced-tarantella was bad enough.  He sure as hell didn’t need Erica making fun of him and Scott crying all over him because, _really Stiles, Derek, why Derek?_

“Stiles,” Derek said.  Stiles blinked and his eyes took a second to refocus on Derek.  “You’re sure you’re okay?”

“Oh yeah, totally fine, just didn’t sleep that well and then, you know, crazy overproductive library time.  You spend enough time analyzing all the different fluids in _Dracula_ , you’d feel like your brain was dribbling out your nose too,” he said, gulping down his—Coke.  Derek had ordered him Coke.  Because Derek was perfect and beautiful and obviously knew about Stiles and Coke.

“Yeah,” Derek said, nodding.  “The whole ‘blood is milk’ thing.”  He made air quotes.  Derek Hale made air quotes.  What.

And also, “Wait, what?” Stiles said.  “The whole what?”

Derek looked embarrassed suddenly, and he shoved a few fries into his mouth.  “You know.  There’s that scene with Mina and the count, where she drinks the blood from his chest, which is obviously like—well, you know, what with the conflation of blood and milk and the whole reversal of gender roles—“

“Stop,” Stiles said.  His left eye twitched.  “I—I need you to stop.  What?”

Derek actually had the gall to blush.  Stiles tried really hard not to think it was kind of adorable.  “I wrote a paper about it,” he said, looking down at his hands.

“About _Dracula._ ”

“Yes.”

“Because you were researching werewolves?” Stiles said, narrowing his eyes.

“What?  No, because I took a class about monsters in literature,” Derek said, like it was so totally obvious.

Stiles squinted even more.  “In high school?”

“No, Stiles, not in high school,” Derek drawled.  He rolled his eyes.  “I took some online courses a few years back.”

Stiles chomped down on a fry.  “How many?” he said. 

Derek shrugged.  “Enough to get a degree.”

“You have a degree?”

“Jesus, yes, why are you asking so many questions?” Derek said, his eyebrows twitching lower. 

“I don’t know, maybe because I apparently don’t know _anything_ about you?” Stiles snapped.  Derek’s face lost all its expression, and he pushed his tray of food around.  Stiles sighed.  “Sorry,” he said.  He dragged one hand over his face.  “Sorry.  I just—I always assumed you never finished high school, let alone college.”

“Technically, I didn’t finish high school,” Derek said, poking at his fries.  “I got my GED online too.”

Stiles hummed.  His face felt hot and he couldn’t seem to get his forehead to unwrinkle.  He drank most of his Coke while Derek stared at him.

“Laura wanted me to,” Derek said.  He picked at his sandwich.  “To get a degree.  When we were in New York, I got my GED and started on college.  It was quick and probably isn’t worth that much, but I figure, maybe someday having a degree will come in handy.”

Stiles blinked.  “Has it?”

“Not really,” Derek said, his mouth twitching.  No smile this time. 

“What, uh, what did you major in?” Stiles said.

The other side of Derek’s mouth started twitching, and he looked embarrassed again, but at least he was almost smiling.  “English lit,” he said.  “So you can probably understand why it hasn’t helped much in my line of work.”

“Dude, what are you talking about, the next time you’re fighting someone you should try analyzing some literature at them, see what happens,” Stiles said, grinning.  “And if it works then I will totally help in the next fight.  Deal?”

“Stiles,” Derek said.  “No.”

“Oh, come on, let me dream a little.”  He picked up his sandwich—was that bologna?  How did Derek know he liked bologna?  “So, um, why lit?”

Derek grabbed a handful of fries and munched for a bit.  Finally he shrugged and said, “Well, mostly I wanted to, you know, rip out Kate’s throat with my bare hands, but—Laura wouldn’t have let me, if she’d known.”  He frowned and sipped at his drink.  “We used to have this great library.  Hundreds of books, some first editions, rare mythologies.  I’d always loved to read.  And in New York, I just—it made it easier.”  He twitched his mouth at Stiles and glanced around them.  The union was pretty empty, probably because it was too early for dinner.

“Yeah,” Stiles said, trying not to be too obvious about staring at Derek.  “I get that.”

\--

Later that night, Erica, Scott, and Isaac all ran off to join the poker tournament.  Isaac was wearing a blue shirt the exact same color as his eyes and shockingly tight jeans, so yeah, Stiles figured he was getting some tonight.  Good for him.

Stiles was obviously not getting some.  Stiles never got any.  All Stiles ever got were snarky eyebrows from Derek and “bitch please” looks from Boyd.  Not that he was bitter.

“Go to college, they said,” he muttered into his pillow.  “It’ll be fun, they said.”

Yup, and there were the eyebrows.  Boyd was probably making a face at him too, but he couldn’t actually see Boyd.

“Clearly whoever said that was not talking about you,” Derek said.  He was sitting on the floor, his back leaning against the empty bed.  For the last hour, he’d been reading over Stiles’ lit paper proposal, making lots of bright green notes in his chicken scratch handwriting.

“ _Clearly_ ,” Stiles agreed.  “I think I’m doing college wrong.  I should probably be getting drunk at least three times a week.  And I should start turning things in late.  And half-assing everything.  Maybe college will be more fun then.”

“Yes,” Derek said, drawing a big circle around something on Stiles’ proposal.  “Do that.”

Stiles waved his arm at Derek, then let it flop down to hang over the bed.  “You are an enabler.  Stop that.”

Derek just smirked at him from the floor and then rolled onto his stomach, which was seriously not fair, because how was Stiles supposed to concentrate when Derek’s ass was in his line of vision?

“How come the kids are better at college than I am?” Stiles grumbled.  “They don’t even go to this school.”

“The kids?” Derek said.  He turned his head and raised one eyebrow at Stiles.

“What, I couldn’t say ‘the betas’ because Boyd is still here, I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, and I didn’t want to say ‘Isaac, Scott, and Erica’ because of too many syllables.  Deal with it.”

Just then Boyd started snoring, which made Stiles break out in a fit of giggles, which in turn made Derek grin brilliantly at him.

“Is he—do you think he’s narcoleptic?” Stiles wheezed, annoyingly dazzled by Derek’s stupid face.

“I don’t know,” Derek said, smirking.  “I think he probably can just fall asleep anywhere.”

“Oh man.  Can we draw on him?”

“What?  No,” Derek said.  He looked comically affronted, with his face all scrunched up and Stiles’ pen settled behind his ear.

“I bet you would’ve said yes if it was Scott.”

“Well, yeah, because that’s Scott.  I actually _like_ Boyd,” Derek said, propping himself up on one elbow and giving Stiles a look that could only be described as sassy.

Stiles fake-gasped.  “No, I don’t believe it.  First you brush your teeth, now you _like people_?  This is just too much for me to handle.” 

Derek rolled his eyes and then flipped onto his back.  The pen fell onto the ground as he tucked his arms behind his head; Stiles tried not to notice the way his shirt had ridden up a bit.  “Sometimes I even like more than one person at a time,” he said, waggling his eyebrows.  “Three, tops.  Never you.”

“I knew it,” Stiles said.  “I knew you didn’t like me.”

“Can’t stand you,” Derek said, grinning.

Stiles felt his heart hiccup a little, so he rolled onto his back to stare at the ceiling.  Was that flirting?  Did that count?  Or was this actually an alternate universe where Derek joked all the time?

If he had to place any bets, he would probably have picked the last option.  He was pretty sure he did not live in a world where Derek Hale flirted at all (unless it was to further his career as a deranged werewolf), and especially not a world in which Derek Hale flirted _with him_.  He was still contemplating the probability of his getting stuck in an alternate reality when suddenly Derek’s face loomed above him.

He screamed and immediately flailed at Derek’s face.  “Jesus Christ, give a guy some warning!” he squeaked.  “You can’t just—do—that.”  He made a wax on, wax off gesture at Derek.

“Is something wrong?” Derek said, squinting at him.  His face was way too close.

“No,” Stiles said, scooting away and sitting up.  “Everything is fine.  I’m just trying to recover from the horror of having your ugly mug so close to mine.”

That earned him a double eyebrow raise _and_ a double mouth twitch.  “Really now,” Derek said.

Stiles was about to respond with something utterly brilliant and snarky when Isaac stumbled in, grinning and with stubble burn all over his face and neck.

“Wow, dude,” Stiles said.  “Congrats on your everything.”

Isaac looked confused.  “What?”

“You’ve, uh, got a little something.”  Stiles waved his hands over his entire upper body.

“Ohhhhh,” Isaac said.  He grinned again and started laughing.  “Yeah.  That.”  He grabbed a t-shirt from his backpack and then started unbuttoning his shirt. 

“Jesus, it’s _everywhere_ ,” Stiles said.  He was pretty sure his eyes were about to pop out.

“I know!” Isaac said, giving an excited little wiggle.  “College is great.  I love college.  I love _your_ college.”

“Oh my god just put your shirt on, stop showing off,” Stiles said.  “You’d think with all the werewolf healing powers that would all be gone by now.”

“Probably wasn’t enough to trigger the healing process,” Derek muttered.  He was leaning against Stiles’ bed, arms crossed.

Isaac was still smiling so much that Stiles was afraid that his face was either going to break or get stuck that way.  Since he was starting to look really psychotic, Stiles wasn’t sure which option would be worse.

“So does this mean you’ll come visit me more?” Stiles said.

“Maaaaybe,” Isaac said.  He was definitely like two seconds away from breaking into song and dance.  It was kind of creepy. 

Erica burst in then, looking almost ready to bite someone’s head off.  Then she took one look at Isaac and screamed, “ _You just had sex!_ ”  That woke up Boyd, and even Boyd glaring at everybody was not enough to curb Isaac’s horrible glee.

Scott appeared a minute later.  He fist bumped Isaac and said, “Yeaaaaah, buddy.”  Stiles kind of figured he’d heard Erica screaming and had come running.

“Was it the skinny jeans?” Erica said.  “I bet it was the skinny jeans.”

“No, I bet it was because you were such a beast at poker, right?” Scott said.

Stiles buried his face in his hands and sighed.

“We should stop talking about this,” he said.  “Let’s just—stop talking about all the people who are having sex who are not Stiles.”

“But you’re—ohhh,” Erica said, ever tactful.  Stiles glared at her between his fingers.

He snuck a peek at Derek, who for some reason looked extra constipated and was also twitching slightly—not in a precursor-to-smile way, either.  Weird.  Derek was so weird.

“I’m gonna go shower,” Isaac practically sang as he grabbed Stiles’ towel and waltzed out.

“Wait, that’s my—“ The door slammed shut behind him.  “Only towel,” Stiles muttered.

“Oh, gross,” Erica said.  “I definitely used that this morning.”

Stiles gave her his best approximation of Boyd’s bitch-face.  Scott said, “Um, me too.”  Stiles groaned and decided that he really needed to find better friends.

\--

His plans for after the pack left consisted mainly of bad movies, a can of frosting, at least three hours of minesweeper, and an economy-sized  bag of Swedish fish.  Sulking was in order. 

But all his plans went to hell when the pack piled into the Camaro and Derek loomed over him, way too close, skimmed his hand down Stiles’ arm, and said, “See you later.”

Sometimes he was really glad he didn’t have a roommate.  It might have been kind of hard to explain why he needed so much alone time.

\--

A few days later, Stiles was finishing up his latest chem report—copper ions were a distracting color, who knew, he really couldn’t be blamed for the crazy high percent error—when Scott called him.  He squinted at the phone and considered not answering, but Scott always got ridiculously offended when he didn’t answer, even if he had a totally legitimate excuse, like class.

He grabbed the last of his sulking Swedish fish (it had turned out to be _a lot more_ than he’d expected, it was taking him _forever_ ) and hopped up on the bed.  “Hey dude, what’s up?” he said.

“How could you not tell me?” Scott yelled.

Stiles flinched.  “Um, tell you what?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe that you’re _dating Derek?_ ”  Scott’s voice shot hilariously into the stratosphere but Stiles was way too distracted to actually appreciate it.

“Wait, what?” Stiles said.  “That’s—what?”

“I thought I was your best friend!”

“What, you are, I just—what are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about how you totally just _forgot_ to tell me that you’re—“

“Okay no, just no, stop saying that, I am totally not dating him, that would be ridiculous.”  He could hear Scott breathing huffily, trust Scott to get angry about something that was totally false.  “Who told you that?”

Scott paused in his angry breathing and then finally said, “Isaac.”

“Okay, well, there you go, Isaac is awesome and all but—“

“And he heard it from Derek.”

“ _What?_ ” Stiles squawked.  “He, wait, _what?_ ”

Scott was really quiet.  He only started talking when Stiles made a frustrated noise at him.  “You aren’t lying,” he said.  “You actually—but then—huh?”

“No, Scott, don’t do that, this is Stiles’ confusion time, not yours, stop it, just tell me what’s going on.”

“You’re sure you aren’t dating him?”

“I’m pretty sure I would know!” he yelled.  He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed heavily.  “Sorry.  Just—explain.”

“Well, Isaac just, like, told me in class today.  That Derek said you guys have been dating for a couple months now—“

“ _A couple months?_ ” Stiles squeaked.

“—and that you were being really weird about it.”

“Um, yeah, because _we aren’t dating._ ”  There were so many things he wanted to do, most of which involved him bashing his head against every hard, static surface in his room.  “Why would he even say that?”

“I mean, I don’t know, maybe he just assumed?  It’s not like you were subtle or anything, I mean, even _I_ knew you liked him, and you’ve liked him _forever_ , and it was just so obvious, and then _he_ was so obvious that maybe he just figured you knew?”

“What?  I—what?”

“I mean, you’ve gotta know he likes you, right?  It’s—kind of gross actually but, I mean, I guess if you like him it’s—“

At least half of Stiles’ brain just gave up then, because, _Derek liked him?_   This was clearly another case of that whole alternate reality thing, which was fine and all, could potentially be awesome, but then there was the whole problem where he definitely was not dating Derek.

“I don’t understand,” Stiles whined.  “I just—we aren’t dating!  We really, really aren’t.”

“Are you sure?  Maybe you just didn’t notice?”

“Scott,” he said, tugging on his short hair.  “I am not actually dumb enough to let something that big slip by me.”

“Um,” Scott said.  “I mean, there was that whole thing where you thought you were straight even though you were totally jonesing after him, so uh, maybe you are?”

Well.  He kind of had a point.

“Okay, but if we were dating, we would be going on dates.  And…doing other things.  Things that I definitely would have noticed happening because I would have had a heart attack from all the excitement, okay?  So, yeah, definitely not—“  And then he remembered how, in the month before school started, he and Derek had watched at least three movies a week, usually accompanied by Stiles’ semi-famous homemade pancakes.  Sometimes accompanied by Derek’s arm almost but not quite resting on Stiles’ shoulders.  And there was that super weird text where Derek had joked about not wanting to give Stiles’ dad another reason to get out the shotgun.  Derek calling him at school, asking if he could come visit.  Derek telling him things, and touching him, and— “Shit, I’m dating Derek Hale.”

Scott gave him a moment before he said, “Even I’m not that dumb.”

Stiles hung up on him then because, well, just because.

Then he emptied the bag of Swedish fish into his mouth which, big mistake, those things were really hard to chew.  But at least by the time he managed to get them all down, he more or less had a game plan.

So he called Derek.

Derek picked up after four rings, saying, “Hey, what’s—“

“ _Why didn’t you tell me we’re dating?_ ” Stiles shouted.

Derek made a choking noise, which would probably have been kind of funny if Stiles weren’t totally freaking out.  “I, what?” Derek eventually said.

“Yeah.  I just found out from Scott that we’ve been dating for, like, two months.  And nobody told me.”

“Um,” Derek said.  “I thought you knew?”

“I mean, yeah, I was totally clued in by all the making out and, like, mindblowing sex which _has not been happening._   Yeah, really obvious.  I didn’t even know you _liked me_ , when did that happen?”  Some small part of him was vaguely aware that he wasn’t actually handling it well at all.  Unfortunately, that part was overpowered by the much larger part which was still pissed.

Derek sighed.  “Okay, just—give me an hour.”

“You—what?”  Definitely not the response he’d expected.

“I’m not having this conversation over the phone,” Derek said right before he hung up.

Stiles was just angry until he realized what Derek had actually been saying, which was not so much “we aren’t talking about this” as “see you in an hour so we can talk about this totally awkward thing face to face” which was so, so bad.  Terrifying, actually.  That was something that Stiles was not ready to deal with.

He considered going to hide in the library, but—well, he actually _wanted_ to be dating Derek, which probably would not happen if he chickened out.  So instead, he finished reading _Dracula_ , even though he didn’t remember anything that happened.  He went over his revised paper proposal—thanks, Derek—one last time.  Then he had thirty minutes to while away until Derek got there—unless he sped, in which case, not even thirty minutes.

He stared at the ceiling and thought bitterly that, of course, of course his dad had actually been right about everything.  Not fair. 

The whole dating thing actually made sense of a lot of his interactions with Derek.  For instance, the smiling—Derek definitely did not smile that much at other people, but sometimes Stiles got like seven smiles in one hour.  And—oh.  When Stiles had been complaining about how he never got laid, and Derek had looked mildly crazed. 

After that particular realization, Stiles spent a good five minutes yelling obscenities into his pillow.  Then he just lay there, hating his life.  It figured that he’d been obliviously dating Derek while simultaneously spending every minute of his life angsting about how Derek was probably way too hot to ever actually like him.

Which—huh.  Derek _liked_ him.  That was—well, that was basically the biggest ego boost ever.

He turned that thought over in his head for a few minutes, thinking it over so much that he almost jumped out of his skin when he heard a knock on the door.  He slid off his bed and then stopped.

The way he saw it, he had two options: he could either jump Derek, or they could actually talk.  As he went to the door, he still hadn’t decided which option he should take.  He stood with his hand on the doorknob for a few seconds and then opened the door.

Derek made the choice for him.  He was holding a giant pizza box in front of him, which would have thwarted Stiles’ jumping plans if he’d decided to go that route.  “Hi,” Derek said.

“Is that cheese?” Stiles said.  “Oh, I mean, hi.”  He stepped back to let Derek in.  Derek edged around him, keeping the pizza box between them.

“So,” Derek said.  “How’re classes?”  He set the pizza in the middle of the bed and absolutely did not look at Stiles.

Stiles bit back a hysterical laugh because, seriously, his life was just ridiculous.  “Classes are fine.  Thanks for those edits, by the way, it’s way easier to find sources now.  So.”  He fidgeted with the corner of the pizza box.  “How’s the pack?”  He jumped up on his bed, sitting on the pillow.  Derek made a face and climbed onto the foot of the bed.

“Same as always,” Derek said.  He shrugged and scratched at the side of his face.

“Good,” Stiles said.  He opened the pizza box and grabbed a few slices.  Of course Derek knew he liked cheese best.  “So we’ve been dating for two months.”

Derek sighed and reached for a slice of pizza.  “I really thought you knew.  Sorry about that.”

For the next minute or so, Stiles ate his pizza and watched Derek, who was brooding at the pizza box.  It was kind of ridiculous actually.  “I’m not mad or anything,” Stiles said.  “Well, not anymore.”  He gnawed on his crust.  “It’s just, I didn’t even know you liked me, so this is kind of—y’know, a bit of a shock.”

He glanced up and was more distracted by the string of cheese stretched between Derek’s mouth and pizza than by Derek’s confused look of surprise.  After Derek had taken care of his cheese problem he said, “Really?”

Stiles blinked.  “That’s all you have to say?”

“I wasn’t being subtle,” Derek said, frowning.  “Even your dad knew.”

“Yeah, well,” Stiles said.  “We can’t all be so observant.”  He grabbed his fourth or fifth piece of pizza—he’d lost count—and picked at a bubble of burnt cheese.  “Wait, so, did I ask you?  The first time?”

Derek raised his eyebrows.  “That’s why I figured you were okay with it.”

Stiles resisted the urge to smother himself with his pillow.  Instead he settled for just stuffing half a slice of pizza in his mouth.  He chewed for a minute before saying, “Were you ever—would you ever have asked me out if I hadn’t, uh, started it?”

The only sound for a few minutes was Derek’s chewing.  Derek wouldn’t look at him.  Finally, he said, “No.”

Stiles laughed.  “So we’ve been dating for two months because I asked you out.  Wow.  This is a new low.”

“It’s not that I wouldn’t have wanted to,” Derek said, getting a weird look on his face.  His eyebrows sank and he lowered his head.  “But you know, I’m not, you can do—“

“If you say something along the lines of ‘better,’ then I am going to punch you in the face,” Stiles said.  “Because you are stupidly attractive and secretly a good guy and you’re the only person I’ve ever known who can fully appreciate my love of Ents, so, no, I’m actually not sure I can do much better.”

Derek narrowed his eyes.  “I’m too old for you.”

“Hogwash,” Stiles said, flailing a little bit.  “Age is just a number, and you’re hot so no one will care.  Besides, that obviously hasn’t stopped you from dating me for the past two months.”  When Derek opened his mouth, Stiles said, “No, stop, stop trying to talk me out of this relationship.  My dad isn’t going to try to kill you, the distance is not an issue, Scott might cry a little but I don’t care, I’m not secretly a hunter, and I’m nineteen now so I’m extremely legal.”  He raised his eyes.  “Anything else?”

He almost laughed at the grudgingly amused look on Derek’s face.

“You don’t like the new trilogy,” Derek said, shrugging.

“Okay, no, the fact that you like it is _your_ flaw, don’t even start with me,” Stiles said.  “You’re allowed to like the podracing scene but not the whole trilogy.”

“You’re supposed to accept me as I am,” Derek said, picking up another slice of pizza. 

“Yeah, well, I can sing Billy Joel to you if you want, but let’s be real, there are more interesting things we could be doing,” Stiles said.  “Also, hey, Derek, let’s be really clear here.  Do you want to go on a date with me?”

Derek squinted at him and made a face like he was trying to dig something out of his teeth.  Stiles was pretty sure Derek had never let anybody else see him looking ridiculous, so that was probably a good sign.

Finally, Derek shrugged and said, “Yeah, okay.”

\--

Stiles jolted awake to the sound of “Hungry Like the Wolf” blaring in his ear.  The problem was, his bed was only a twin and, well, he wasn’t used to sharing it, so when he started to flail, he accidentally rolled himself out of the bed.  He screamed as he fell.  “Ow, fuck, ow,” he grumbled as he hauled himself to his feet.  He fished under his pillow for his phone while ignoring the fact that Derek—who was _in his bed_ —was not-so-quietly amused about it all.  “I hate you,” he said right before he answered his phone.  “Yeah, hi, what’s up?” he said as Derek actually snorted.

“Just thought I’d check in with you,” his dad said.  “Haven’t heard from you in a while.  How’re midterms?”

“Midterms are—going,” Stiles said.  He scratched at his hip just under the waistband of his boxers.  “How’re you?”

He never actually heard how his dad was because at that moment, Derek slid out of his bed wearing only boxers and walked across the room to the door.  He turned around and smirked at Stiles before going out.  It was pretty distracting.  “Sorry, what?” Stiles said to his dad.

His dad sighed.  “I just said, same old same old.  Are you okay?”

“I, uh, well,” he said, realizing that Derek was just wandering his floor practically naked.  “I’m, I’m good.  So, tell me about work yesterday.”

He listened to his dad talk for a few minutes about the station, how one of his deputies had the flu, how someone had called for them to get a cat out of a tree and he’d had to transfer them to the fire department.  He was complaining about people expecting him to climb trees like a monkey when Derek came back in.

And Stiles got a really dumb grin on his face because he was dating a Greek god, he was totally allowed to be smug.  Derek stopped walking, confused.  “Hey Dad?” Stiles said.

“Yeah,” his dad said.

“Remember how you thought I was dating Derek Hale?”

There were two beats of silence and then, “Oh god.”

“No, you’ll like him, shut up,” Stiles said.  “Now you can bask in the knowledge that you were totally right about everything all along.  It’ll be fun.”  Derek finally shook off the confused look and walked back to the bed.  He knelt down and started looking for his shirt on the floor.  “Here’s a plan,” Stiles said to his dad, tracing the knobby line of Derek’s spine with his eyes.  “We should invite the pack to Thanksgiving.”  Derek looked up at him, one eyebrow raised.

His dad sighed.  “I’m not cooking.”

“I’m totally on it,” Stiles said.  “Don’t you worry.  But right now I’ve kind of gotta go, I have things to do and—“

“Oh my god, just—be safe and don’t—“

“Bye, Dad!” Stiles yelled as he slammed his phone shut.  He scrubbed at his face, well aware that he was blushing.  When he finally felt marginally less embarrassed, he put his hands down and then squawked, because Derek was standing really close, frowning curiously at him.  “Can I help you?” Stiles said.

Derek shrugged.  It turned out the shrug was even more attractive with bare shoulders than with his leather jacket.  “Thanksgiving,” he said.  “You’re assuming we’ll still be together.”

“Um, yeah, because we’ve already lasted two months,” Stiles said, rolling his eyes.  “And I think we’re both pretty aware of each other’s baggage, so, yeah, I think we’ll be together at Thanksgiving.  I hope you like canned cranberry sauce.”  He glared at Derek, whose mouth was beginning to twitch.  Before Derek could break out one of his devastating smiles, Stiles grabbed his hips and kissed him.

A few minutes later, Derek pulled away, full-on grinning, and said, “Okay, I guess I can come to Thanksgiving.”

Stiles laughed and gave him a loud smacking kiss.  “Awesome, I’m glad we’ve got that settled.  On to more important matters.  Are you hungry?  Want Chinese?”  He opened up his desk and rummaged through a stack of papers for the menu to the Great Wall.  Derek crowded up against his back to peer over his shoulder, curling one hand around his side.

“Do they have Singapore noodles?” Derek said.  His chest was really warm, so Stiles leaned back into him.

“Yeah,” he said.  “Yeah, they do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come find me on tumblr, where my username is also sixchord :) Right now I'm posting prompt fics you won't find on AO3!

**Author's Note:**

> If you like what you read, come find me on [my tumblr](http://sixchord.tumblr.com)! Mostly I just reblog all the Hobbit, Les Mis, and Teen Wolf things, in addition to sometimes posting writing stuff.


End file.
